A Haven Thing
by sunshineditty
Summary: A collection of drabbles based upon my feelings for episodes in Seasons 1-4 in no particular order.
1. Twenty-Seven Seconds

**Coda to Episode 4.4 "Lost and Found"**

* * *

Her boys, her rebel and her cop.

She couldn't believe it. She was back. Here. With _them_, even if they didn't know it. _She_ knew it, could feel it, feel them. God she would kiss William if he were within reach for returning what she never thought she'd get (remember) again.

Hands touched her then, disrupting the hurtling sensation of her thoughts and she knew that touch, even if it wasn't as intimately as she always hungered for (and having sex as Sarah didn't count). Eagerly she opened her eyes, _Audrey's_ eyes instead of a newborn personality, and saw deeply wounded happiness on a beautiful craggy face.

Nathan.

She was barely aware of others around them - except for Duke who stirred senses not bound up by Nathan's commanding presence - as her cop gathered her into his arms, smiling as gently and lovingly as any woman could dare to dream.

He was close and warm and _feeling_; their connection hadn't broken, his love hadn't died.

For a brief, eternal, endless moment, the universe shrunk until it was just the two of them, encasing them in a golden bubble where she could just _be_. Even if Audrey Parker was an assumed identity like all the others before her, he _knew_ her to her bones, to her Parker soul, and she was. It didn't matter what came before, only what came _after_.

And then the reality of Haven reasserted itself with the cold press of metal in her hands, a barrier _Nathan_ had put between them, and she panicked. The Barn was gone and everything about this was unprecedented.

The rules had changed.

She _remembered_ and twenty-seven years hadn't passed in the ether.

So she did the only thing that could save them all.

She lied.

* * *

**A/N: Just a random drabble that wouldn't leave my brain while watching the episode (I felt vindicated when it turned out she wasn't actually Lexie).**


	2. Amazing

**Coda to Episode 2.5 "Roots"**

* * *

A man stands at her door with flowers and all Audrey wants to do is shut the door in his face.

Instead she allows him inside her home, her haven as it were, and politely laughs at his lame joke. She isn't sure what draws her to him, other than his acerbic reaction to his Trouble, and outsider attitude.

No, that's a lie. She knows why.

Audrey is lonely, despite Nathan's tentative friendship and Duke's dubious interest, so when Chris asked her out she couldn't find a reason to say no.

Now she can barely remember why she said _yes_.

Audrey didn't like how he dealt with the Novelli and Keegan situation, finding herself wishing for Nathan's steady presence at her side instead, because for all their differences, the work brings them into focus and their edges blur together into one competent whole. They _click_, for want of a better word, and resolve each case with astonishing ease. It's probably why she didn't question Nathan turning up when he had because _of course_ he would find her during troubled (both capital and lowercase) times.

Chris' hand in hers hadn't felt right, the calluses rasping unpleasantly against her own, and she wanted to let go immediately, but knew it was foolish to feel that way. Audrey had gently mocked and prodded Nathan into pursuing Jess, and she could do no less. They are loners by nature - or perhaps circumstances - so she couldn't ask him to do what she wouldn't do herself.

The candles scattered around the room set a romantic mood she suddenly regrets. His earlier phone call asking to continue their non-date had seemed like a good idea, a sort of time out from the stresses of the day, but his presence in her home is just...words escape her.

She just wishes she knew why.

But Audrey Parker - or whomever she really is - prefers action over introspection so she stops questioning her ambivalence towards Chris and allows him to draw her into his arms, justifying it as the correct response to such powerful words.

A man wanted her for _her_ and not for what she could or would _do_ for him.

Too bad it was the wrong man saying it.


	3. Any Minute

**Episode 2.9 "Lockdown" - what if Audrey couldn't stop Dr. Underwood from shooting her?**

* * *

Nathan jerks to a stop, the report of a fired gun ringing through the mostly empty police station.

"They got through?"

Dwight shakes his shaggy head. "It couldn't be. I counted the men ringing the building and I know they were behind me when I came through the door."

"You might be wrong."

"Trust me, Nathan, I'm not. Someone else…"

Nathan sprints down the long hallway before Dwight finishes speaking. Audrey is somewhere alone with a Troubled person - and he knows her instinct for self-preservation isn't strong when faced with someone who needs help. It's why he always goes along with her, despite being Interim Chief, because she needs someone to watch her, protect her when she can't protect herself.

"Parker! Parker!"

He pushes through the ring of people, hardly aware of a blackened body fallen to the side, and sees his partner cradled in Chris Brody's arms. He can't see a wound on the front, but he can see blood streaking the other man's sleeves.

"What's going on?"

"She...she…"

No other words emerge from his lips and Nathan's too frightened to ask more. He's never seen Audrey so still, even while sleeping. A few times she's fallen asleep in his presence, she mumbled, moved, breathed...now she's still. Like a corpse.

"Give her to me," he growls, nearly ripping Audrey from her boyfriend's arms. Brody reflexively tries to keep her, but Nathan is stronger and more determined. Audrey is _his_ partner, _his_ to hold, and he won't be denied.

"Parker, it's okay. It'll be okay. The guys outside left so we'll call for help and you'll be okay."

He presses his lips to her forehead, thankful he can still feel her warmth. Still feel _her_. "Someone call an ambulance. Now!"

"Chief. Nathan. Audrey is beyond help. The doc shot her point blank in the back of the head."

A voice. He knows that voice. Someone he's known for a long time is talking to him.

Nathan doesn't listen to the voice because the voice is speaking nonsense. Audrey is alive. Alive. He can _feel_ her. He would know if she left him. She wouldn't just leave him without saying a word. They agreed he's her ride. Always her ride.

"Call me a fucking ambulance or you're fired!"

He waits for Audrey to open her eyes and laugh, say, _"Why Nathan Wuornos, I didn't know you could swear."_ He waits, not understanding why her eyes are still closed.

"I learned what Dwight's Trouble is," he whispers in her ear. "If someone fires a gun around him, he catches the bullet. So stop pretending you're hurt and get up. We have things to do."

Audrey is a dedicated cop and she hates leaving things unfinished.

Any minute now, she'll get up.

Any minute.


End file.
